A new local 'family fix' series needs some serious help itself, writes Deborah Hill Cone.
Alia. Just Alia. That is the name of the mediator in Family Feuds, a local show about fixing family psychodramas. One name is fine if you're Rihanna or Madonna but personally I like my shrink to have two ... if not a few letters after their second name as well.
A Dr in front of it would be comforting, too. Even the interior décor specialists on home improvement shows get two names and they are not zshushing up some vulnerable family's psyche.
I'm not sure what Alia's qualifications are for on-screen psyche-renovation, apart from her obvious photogenic bone structure. A fat lot of good that does her in her last assignment, Wednesday on TV One, sorting out a dysfunctional family made up of clean-freak Tony, his disgruntled wife Karina and their messy teenage daughter Kayla.
Oh dear, I realise I am sounding far too negative about the programme and I don't mean to be. Because Family Feuds, despite its gimmicky name, is a worthy idea.
It shows us a normal family with a problem, then takes them away for three days to a rather creepy Gothic cottage in the country where they grapple with their issues and hopefully comes to some kind of positive resolution. (Or just get weirded out by the environs and decide their life is not so bad after all.)
But all this depends on the skills of the mediator who can lead people to have a profound breakthrough and see their lives in a new way. Here is how Alia deals with the poor, desperate Tony: "I've heard you, I've heard you, I've heard you." Tony: "I know that." Alia: "Why did you say that Tony?" Tony: "I know that you've heard me." Help!
Alia seems to collude with the mother and daughter as they form a power block against the husband, whom they ridicule as a clean freak. "You're talking down to me like I'm a child," Tony says to Alia - and I have to agree.
Alia wonders why Tony takes to his bath for hours. Mate, I don't blame you.
Alia also fails to address glaring issues like why Tony is bitter and stressed working from 3am in the morning as a cleaner, yet his wife Karina doesn't seem to work at all.
These unanswered questions get in the way of involving oneself in the life of the family or caring about the outcome.
It is a real shame the producers of Family Feuds didn't try harder to find another talent like Nigel Latta to anchor the show because the programme, which is funded by you and me through New Zealand on Air, could have been powerful and life-changing, showing a positive way out of common domestic conflicts. Hopefully Alia fares better in other episodes when she deals with a disputed will, sibling rivalry, a family business turned sour and a family "coming out". Somehow I doubt it.
Family Feuds debuts on TV One, Wednesday at 8pm.
Editor's Note: The show's host is Alia Simpson, a life coach and communications expert.
